As is well known in the building construction industry, it is often necessary to strike numerous chalk marks to provide precise guide lines for the installation of partition plates, intersection lines of modular flooring and similar applications. Since the distances normally involved are greater than the span of a single worker's arms, it is usually necessary to employ an assistant or to utilize a makeshift means of temporarily holding one end of a chalk line, such as a nail. Such expedients are either time consuming, inconvenient and likely to be inaccurate, and, when utilizing an assistant, costly.
One attempt at creating a time-saving device when using a chalk line marking device is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,622,471, 1971 (hereinafter Lynde et al) Lynde et al provides a means of holding one end of a tape or chalk line by means of a device . With such an arrangement, the device is held in place frictionally, which gives poor assurance that the device once placed remains undisturbed and where desired. To counter this problem, Lynde et al must be made heavy and thus bulky to provide enough friction to hold the device in place. Moreover, Lynde et al guides a chalk line under the middle of the device through a channel, enabling the snapping of but a single chalk line at a time.
What is needed is an inexpensive, secure, lightweight, convenient and compact device which will enable but a single worker to layout and snap multiple chalk lines accurately and quickly.